Single mom Megan Clemens had her two elementary school-age kids mentally prepared for the new school year at Lower Lake Elementary, which began Monday, Aug. 27. Her second-grader, Tatania, couldn”t wait to get her homework.
Because Clemens lives in Clearlake, she got intradistrict transfers for Tatiana and her brother Jesse after problems with bullying had chased them out of Pomo Elementary, said Clemens. She thought they were enrolled, but when she checked the lists of student”s names to see who their teachers were Tatiana wasn”t on it. Her fourth-grade son, Jesse, was. She thought it was a mistake.
On the first day of school, a dressed-up Tatiana, lunch in hand, was told there wasn”t room for her. Clemens said she was asked by Principal Greg Mucks to go into the library with a group of other parents to await teacher assignments for their kids. She knew something was wrong when one child came back crying.
Tatiana was told they could take her for one day, but that there was no room for her for the rest of the year. “It was psychologically devastating,” said Clemens. She said after Tatiana lost her father earlier this year to a Valentine”s Day crash on Highway 20, she wished she”d been able to prepare her daughter better for the sudden change in plans.
“They could”ve sent the parents a letter and said, hey, parents, this is what”s going on,” and then we could”ve prepared them,” said Clemens. She said Mucks asked her if she wanted to take Jesse out of the Lower Lake school and opted to wait to see if his teacher was a good fit for him. With Tatiana now enrolled at Burns Valley Elementary, that leaves Clemens trying to be in two places at the same time, as both schools let out at 2 p.m.
Mucks explained that Lower Lake Elementary limits its four second-grade classes to 21 students each in order to qualify for state class size reduction funding, and that California education code says that students who live within a particular school”s boundaries take precedence over those with intradistrict transfers. “We”ve spent a lot of time trying to predict numbers,” said Mucks, who has been the principal at Lower Lake Elementary for 18 years. He said in all that time, he”s never had to turn students away on the first day of school before. He said he had approved the Clemens children”s transfers contingent on space being available, and that he hadn”t known there wasn”t until the first day of school.
Kindergarten, first and second grades are all full, said Mucks, with six kindergarteners being turned away and five second-graders, all with transfers.
Mucks explained that enrollment was up 50 students higher than was projected. He attributes that mostly to the recent re-drawing of the school”s boundaries and his willingness to accommodate families living within the old boundaries. And while he said what causes enrollment spikes isn”t certain, Mucks pointed to the middle portion of the form Tatiana”s mother had to fill out in order to get a transfer that spells out in all caps that enrollment hinges on whether or not there is room. He added that Clemens can put her daughter on a waiting list, noting that enrollment typically changes between the beginning of school and roughly October. A district policy allows parents a choice of schools within the district, as long as there is room, said Mucks.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com.
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